Chapter 4

Tank had been standing in the doorway listening to our conversation while staving off possible eavesdroppers.

"We gonna do this?"

I leaned back in my chair raising my arms up over my head in a stretch. I needed to get back to the gym.

"How much did you hear?"

"Enough. I knew about what happened between Connie and the Trapula kid but I didn't know she was in hiding."

"When did all of this happen? How come I wasn't made aware of it?"

"The day after your mom's …. I thought you had enough on your plate."

"Right. We need an extraction plan, but first, we need to find her."

Leaning forward I began searching the internet for information that would help me find Connie. Keeping her safe would not be a problem as long as we could manage to find her before Trapula got to her.

My phone beeped that I had a text message. It was from Stephanie. 'Hi. How are you?' I was still unsure if I was prepared to talk to her, or even if I wanted to. What would I say? I had to make a choice. Find Connie or chat with Stephanie? The option was easy. I was not going to let her run my life any longer. Not that day, anyway. I ignored her call.

Tank and I were brainstorming where Connie might have gone when Les tapped on my door.

"What?" I called out. "I'm busy."

Les pushed the door open, followed by Bobby and Hector.

"You heard about Connie Rizzoli? She's missing, right?" Les began.

"I heard you got a call from Rigazio. You know the whole story?" Bobby asked.

I nodded then asked, "How do you know about that call?"

"Read it on the call log."

"What are we doing about it?" Bobby again.

"¿Vamos a encontrarla, si?" Hector added. We are going to find her, yes?

"Si. We'll find her."

At that moment, I was tempted to call Stephanie for her help, after all. Not for me, but for Connie. Steph was one of the best researchers I had ever encountered, plus she had known Connie most of her life. She had a knack for sniffing out the truth, like a sixth sense. I was about to reach for my phone when Tank reiterated, "Guys. For now, the fewer people who know about this situation, the better. Got it?"

Hector missed nothing. He caught my quick glance at Tank. Taking his phone in his hand, he tapped in some data. I knew he was deleting Ray's call from the log.

I had guessed his comment was as much for my benefit as theirs. Stephanie could keep her mouth shut when told to but we needed to keep communications down to a minimum. Our phone lines were secure, but technology changed by the second. It was not always possible to keep up.

Les began again, "We need to think like Connie. Where would she go to feel safe?"

We tossed around a few places we knew she might trust like her grandmother's old house that remained vacant after her death, but nothing jumped out at us. Hector was quiet, his mind on rev. When he spoke, we listened.

"Yo sé dónde se esconde. Lo sé." I know where she is. I know.

He rounded my desk and tapped his way through my secure files. Had it been anyone else, I would have objected but Hector could get into anything he wanted. He was that good. After less than a minute of searching and a string of Spanish swears, mostly directed at me, he stopped, stood and smiled.

"Aqui." He said. "Ella es aqui." He turned my screen to face everyone, leaving glowing blue question marks on their faces. Here. She is here.

"What is that?" Bobby asked. He was an incredible medic, but his technical skills were lacking.

"Aqui." He said again. "Ella es aqui." Here. She is here.

"Are you sure?"

"Si. Absolutamente." Yes, absolutely.

Hector had pulled up a schematic of a security job we had done several years back. I loosely understood his personal codes and markings. Green lines designated where the feed lines for camera surveillance would go, blue denoted the light sensors. A third color, red, showed the lines going to the windows and door motion detectors. He again tapped the keyboard knowingly and an overlay of an architect's diagram of that same building appeared. One that he had acquired from the city assessor's office, as he always had, so he could set up the security system. If Hector was anything, he was thorough. The building's first floor was only about four to five hundred square feet but appeared to have a small attic and a basement. He easily slid one diagram over the other. The pieces of the puzzle suddenly fit together perfectly. He had found Connie, or at least where she would most likely be hiding.

The building was the illustrious bond office. In the back of my mind, I remembered Hector making mention at the time we installed his system, that Vinnie had a sort of apartment in his basement. It was leftover from the previous building owner. It was not much, but it had a few pieces of furniture, small kitchenette with running water, and a toilet. Vinnie used it for his dalliances, apparently. Hector had joked at the time about finding duck feathers on the floor so I had forcibly erased that memory from my mind.

Together we contrived an elaborate scheme to find Connie, get her to safety, all while hopefully confusing the hell out of anyone else looking for her.

I met with my afternoon client as the team gathered needed supplies: A half-dozen navy blue jumpsuits, baseball caps, acrylic paint, a furniture dolly, and several women's wigs. Ella went to work with her embroidery skills. Hal and Scott headed to Ramon's junkyard to find a large panel van. Cal designed and manufactured a magnetic logo.

"Good job, men," I said after our meeting as I surveyed our finished project. "First light, we head out." I still had not told them what we were doing exactly and why, but they never questioned my orders. The fewer people who knew the details, the better.

Tank, Les, Bobby, Hector and I filled my desk with our notes as we lobbed 'what ifs' back and forth to assure our success. After a few fist pumps, back slaps, and general testosterone spikes, we retired for the night. Tomorrow was going to be a long day.

I was up before dawn and then headed out for my normal run, wanting to keep up the appearance of business as usual, in case we were being watched. We were.

Ray Rigazio had little formal education. He had clawed his way up the ladder with hard work and determination, earning every rung he had climbed, with the sweat of his brow. I had to respect the man for his efforts, which was why I had granted him a sort of ceasefire between us, although I disagreed with his career choice.

Bobby, or Robert Trapula to the business world, on the other hand, was well educated, well dressed and had been handed the position after the premature death of his father. There were rumors on the streets that he may have had a hand in his father's early 'retirement' but since it did not involve my company or me directly, I kept my nose clean. Robert Trapula was not someone you wanted to piss off needlessly.

Ray was old school and lived by ancestral rules. He also had a very deep love of family.

Bobby, on the other hand, had set up his own playbook. He played dirty. Very dirty. I was not surprised to discover that his people would be watching Rangemen for any signs of Connie, knowing that Ray would have called me and not Sebring, the head of another security firm in town, for help. It did not really matter, in the end, if Trapula knew that we had Connie. Once we had her, we could keep her safe.

Meanwhile, in another part of town, a team of six of my men, dressed in matching uniforms, descended upon Connie's home, just outside of a mostly Italian neighborhood in Trenton that we reverently called Guinea Gulch, a few short blocks from Officer Joe Morelli's home and that of his mother.

My men left an abandoned warehouse near Stark Street, then drove to Connie's house making a few appropriate detours for the fun of it, just before 8 AM. Once there, they poured out of the white and blue panel van marked 'Benito and Marietta Movers'. Their job, as far as they knew, was to pack up, then remove any and all of Connie's furniture and personal belongings. The word we'd spread on the street was that Connie had skipped town to avoid Benny Trapula's wrath and was having her things stored until they could be sold since she was strapped for money. A for sale sign was placed on her front lawn and her car was taken to her uncle's house. Ray Rigazio was directed to make a covert appearance, implying this was all his doing, then steal from the scene giving credence to the farce we had created. He could have won an Oscar for his portrayal of the mob boss rolling down the tinted rear window of his limo, and then back up again as he instructed his driver to pull from the curb.

Other staff members drove several vehicles to and from clandestine locations, picking up and dropping off family members camouflaged to resemble a dark-haired woman - Connie. The vehicles danced through the street of Trenton like a well-choreographed ballet.

Tank and I headed to Vinnie's around ten. I parked my Porsche in the back lot, popped the trunk covertly, then walked around the building and made our grand entrance through the front door. Lula was there to answer the phone while Vinnie tried to cope with Connie's absence. He was flustered with the amount of work Connie filtered through easily, no less appreciative of her efforts. We spoke animatedly for effect, Lula contributing to our ruse, though she had no idea. She had to be the worst liar in the world unless the matter suited her needs. Stephanie could have kept her under control. Sliding my phone out of my pocket, I found she had left another text. 'Hi. Are you okay?' Later, Babe.

Out of the corner of my eye, I watched a black and yellow BMW with oversized rear tires, and booming rap music loud enough to screw with a person's alpha rhythm and cause seizures, creep past the office. It was the same vehicle that had followed me on my early morning run. Benny's buddies could not have been more obvious if they had stuck their head out of the sunroof and shouted, "we're here". I texted a quick message to Hal, who was heading up the team at Connie's residence. His immediate reply was that the mini gumbas in training had indeed driven by at least twice.

Good to know.

I texted Hal back, to keep me posted if they returned and when then they left again so I could time my maneuver. I guessed that they were making the rounds between Connie's home, Rangemen, the bond office and trying to follow the black SUV charade in fifteen to twenty-minute intervals. Les was in charge of that part of the motorcade and Scott was monitoring the traffic in front of the office, so I texted them too.

When the text came in that they had just arrived at Connie's, I left Tank to deal with Vinnie and Lula. I excused myself to use the restroom then scurried down into the basement. I had ten maybe fifteen minutes max.